This week I was reminiscing about the days back when I bowled on the PBA. Now I didn’t bowl full time like the guys you see every week, I bowled a 6 week tour swing, back when I was living on the west coast in sunny California. I was taken back to those days realizing just how cold it is here in the great state of Michigan. I think last night it was down to 10 degrees!!!  Again I ask myself, why did I move back?  But everything does happen for a reason and this is where I am supposed to be I guess.  Well I was thinking about writing this week about the first tour event where I made a paycheck.  I would like to take you on my personal journey when this all happened. Have fun, sit back, relax and read.  

It was January in the year 2003. At the time I was working for AMF as a pro shop Manger and West coast Technical advisor for the AMF owned pro shops. I was on PBA staff with Ebonite at the time. Sounds kind of funny that I worked for one company and bowled for another, but that is another story. So I packed up the Suburban and headed out to Washington. That week was not a productive week, so let’s move forward to the following week. We packed the Suburban back up and headed to Medford Oregon, the home of the great Marshall Holman. We made the 7 hour drive to Medford, a tiny little town but a huge welcoming city for the Professional Bowlers. For a few minutes I felt really good. I was thinking to myself, this is great, I feel like a star. Then reality set in and it’s time to get to business. I walked into Lava Lanes in Medford and this was a brand new state of the art bowling center. The concourse was huge, plenty of room to move around. The settee area was also a great size to move bowling balls around from lane to lane. I can not forget the restaurant in the bowling center. Yes I said restaurant and not a snack bar. They had every dish was named after a famous bowler. This place really knew how to make bowlers feel important. I got a seat in the restaurant and watched some horse racing. Yea they even had off track betting. I didn’t make any wagers because I wanted to really focus on the reason I was here. That was to bowl at my best.  

After checking out the bowling center and making my way to the locker room I decided to check into my hotel and get a good nights rest.  The next day was the official practice session, so I got my equipment ready, headed out to the lanes and practiced. In practice session, you try to see what type of ball reaction you will get and how to play the lanes, but I will tell you that the practice session and the actual event, plays differently. This is a result of the oil pattern and the lane condition being cleaned off the lanes and reapplied more then once. Usually the oil is a little bit wetter and the dry usually plays a little drier. So after about an hour and a half of practice, I decided to call it an afternoon. I found great ball reactions with a couple bowling balls and felt confident for the first day of qualifying. The two bowling balls I felt the most comfortable with were the Red Predator and the V2 Pearl. Both gave me some good ball reactions. Feeling confident going into qualifying is a great feeling. If you’re unsure of things you can start to over analyze lanes and bowling equipment. You always want to keep it simple. So it was off to grab a bite to eat and relax in the hotel and watch some ESPN or whatever caught my attention on the T.V. 

Today is the day. I go in to the bowling center and get ready for roll call. The first qualifying block is 8 games long and the top 64 return the next day for another 8 games of qualifying. I started out my set with a few solid games. Popped in a couple 240’s 250’s and had a couple games left to finish qualifying. I kept looking over at the big projector wall to see the number for the cut line. I kept seeing my name in the top 64. With two games left and a lot of nerves I kept trying to keep my head in the moment. It was kind of hard because I was bowling with a few big names. To the right of me was the great Marshall Holman, which drew a huge crowd. Now to the left of me was Pete Weber. Another crowd pleaser. Oh and who was on my pair to boot, non other then the great Chris Barnes. Can I tell you that was probably the biggest crowd of people that I have ever bowled in front of.  I started out the 7^th game with a three bagger. Then came number four five and six. The crowd started to gather seeing that there was someone with a string of strikes, and that person was me. I looked back once and could not believe the amount of people cheering me on. So I proceed to put my head down and not let that bother me. So I step up in the 7^th frame and throw another strike. I started to realize that my look on the lanes was getting better every shot I threw. The 8^th frame was a little bit of a fan favorite. I got up threw the ball and left a 7 pin. But wait here comes that great bowling help called the messenger, and it toke the 7 pin out for strike number 8. The crowd erupted and I had to take a minute and play to the crowd. The 9^th frame comes up and I strike yet again. Yes folks, I have the front nine in a PBA Tour event! The tenth frame is coming. I try to stay focused and not let my outside surroundings get into my head. The tenth shot I flush for another strike. Now I am really nervous. I have thrown 300 games in the past, but never had a chance on a stage like this. So I try to calm myself down, and wait for Pete Weber to go and throw his shot. He looks at me and passes it on to me. He said, “Go ahead, this is your spotlight kid.” So I get up and I keep telling myself to not get slow. We are bowling on the Cheetah Pattern and it definitely hooks. So I let it go and trust me, I didn’t get slow with it! I heaved that ball down the lane and alas my string was over. I left a seven pin. I ended up shooting 289 and I looked over at Pete and said “Man that was my first chance at a 300 game on tour” You know he gave me some of the best advice right at that moment. He turned to me and said “You did exactly what you were supposed to do. You made a good shot and hit the pocket. You can not control the pins. Great game and move on to the next one” He’s right. You can’t control what happens once the bowling ball leaves your hand. So I moved on to the next pair.  

One game left and I am still in the cut and still kind of shaking form the last game. I started off with a wash out and then another washout. I told myself to relax and get focused. I ran off the next 9 strikes to make the cut.  

I am going to wrap this up for the week, but I wanted to take you only a small trip with me on how it was to bowl on the PBA level. Maybe one day you might be sitting in front of your computer writing stories of your experiences. I hope you enjoyed this week and as always you can email me and ask me any questions that you may have.

Until next week, Happy Holidays and hope you get everything you wanted for Christmas. 

T.J. Yeip is the Manager of GLC Bowling and Lead Technical Advisor. You can email him directly at Thomas.Yeip@glcbowling.com

This week I would like to take a step back from all the little tips.  Normally I write about how to do this better or that better and what you need to do to be more consistent.  All those things are great, but someone recently asked how do you do the ball reviews, and how do you actually determine the differences between all the bowling balls that you have tested.  This brings us to this week’s article about how I actually do a bowling ball test.  I will cover from when I first look at how I should drill the ball all the way to when I am sitting at my desk enjoying a cup of coffee and actually writing it.  

The first thing I do when I get a new bowling ball is to determine its character.  What was the ball designed to do.  The next step is to lay out the ball.  I work on a layout that will be conducive to what the bowling ball is designed to do on a given lane condition. Let’s look at the Fast by Storm ball review I did earlier this year. You know that one even has a video review that you can watch and actually see what the bowling ball does on the lane (Fast). Ok so let’s get back to how I started and ended up with the Fast by Storm.  

This bowling ball was a stronger version of the Street Rod Pearl that Storm released the year before. With that in mind, I mapped out this bowling ball to be a longer ball reaction with a strong back end. Once I map out the bowling ball and I am happy with what I see, I go right to the drill press and drill the gripping holes. After that is finished this is where all the fun starts to happen. I get to go out and see what this bowling ball does on the lanes. So why don’t you come on down to the lanes with me and lets start to go through what I see when I am bowling. 

Well thank you for coming back and joining me out on the lanes for the Storm Fast ball review. Now that I have a pair of lanes to go out and throw this bowling ball let’s first start by some stretching and warm up shots to get my body ready for the test. You know you can’t just go out and toss the ball like you would if you do not stretch and get loosened up first right? Now that we are out on the lanes and we are all warmed up and ready to try this review, I typically will start with my favorite starting point on the lane and see what type of reaction I see the ball do on the lane. Once I see what the initial ball path does, I start to test the ball from a variety of different angles on the lane. This will give me a reference point as to how strong the overall bowling ball is on the lane condition. As I am trying multiple angles, I also try different ball speeds along with different releases to get a clearer picture for the variety of bowling styles there are in this sport. You know just because it will work for one style does not always mean they will work for other styles, unless given different lane conditions or even ball surfaces.  

The last step is to finish up all the bowling that I have done with the test ball and start to write some notes as to what I saw during my testing. After that I wipe the sweat of my forehead and call it a day. The final step is to actually put it to print and post the review for all to see. 

When I get back into my office, I sit down at the desk, take out my notes from the previous testing, grab my coffee, and start to put together the written format of the ball review. I double check the manufacturers specs on the bowling ball to make sure I do not provide any misinformation and start to give you the reader some insight to this new bowling ball release.  After this is all done you have a ball review.  I hope you enjoyed your journey with me this week into this part of my life and work. Soon you will start to see video reviews on our site with every bowling ball release that I test. From here you can actually see the bowling ball motion and have a greater connection with the equipment that is out today and what you can expect to see when choosing the correct bowling ball for you. As always if you have any questions or comments I would love to hear from my readers. Don’t forget to check out our facebook page and we are now up on twitter.

Until next week have a great time bowling and tune in next week for another journey with T.J. Yeip and GLC Bowling. 

T.J. Yeip is the Manager and Lead Technical Advisor for GLC Bowling. You can email him directly at Thomas.yeip@glcbowling.com

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Well I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I was stuffed just like that turkey for a couple days. If you were one of the brave ones that ventured out shopping on the infamous Black Friday then more power to you.  I hope you stopped in your local pro shop.  I spent a productive day at the shop helping bowlers. This week I would like to talk about bowling ball reaction and how you can use what you see with your bowling ball on the lanes to adjust your game and improve your scores.

Bowlers ask me often: What is the magic ball that will give me a certain reaction?  Well I hate to tell you folks, but it’s not just the bowling ball.  You can have a great bowling ball in your hand, and if you do not fully understand how that bowling ball is suppose to react, then how can you line up and be consistent? Well you can’t. That is unless you understand bowling ball reaction. Now if you want a bowling ball drilled so it will go down the lane and flip, that’s great, any reputable Pro Shop can do that. But is that what you need for the lane conditions you are bowling on? Or do you need a bowling ball for heavy oil, and you want it drilled to hook in the oil? That’s great too. You can get that, but do you know what to do and where to stand with that bowling ball?

Let’s first start with the long and flip drilling on a bowling ball.  If you are the type of bowler that wants that kind of reaction, do you understand that it might not work the way you want it to.  Remember, you can have the right bowling ball, but if you are using it on the wrong oil pattern, then it just won’t be affective.  If you are bowling on a medium to heavy oil pattern, and you are trying to use the long and flip drilled bowling ball, more often than not, you will see that the bowling ball will not recover in the back end enough, and when you try and square up to the lane that it takes off to much in the back.  You need to notice the oil pattern you are bowling on and use the proper equipment for that particular pattern.  If you like to swing and bring the ball, and the lanes tell you that you can’t then why keep trying to do it?  Watching your bowling ball will tell you how to attack the lanes.

Now if you are trying to swing and bring the heavy oil layout ball then you will see that the bowling ball will not make it to the pocket strong, or that you leave a lot of corners.  You need to watch what you bowling ball is telling you. Most of the time, if you are using a heavy oil drilled bowling ball, the bowling ball will want to rev up to soon, and will actually be weaker in the back part of the lane. This means that you need to square up to the lane more and play a straighter line. When you see that the bowling ball is hooking too much in the front part of the lane, then that’s when you start to move more to the middle of the lane, and use a bowling ball that will finish stronger, kind of like your flip drilled ball.

Let’s recap: When you are attacking the lane conditions, watch what your bowling ball is doing. Where is it hooking, or not hooking.  If you get to much hook in the front part of the lane, then go to your bowling ball that goes longer, and has more backend reaction.  If your bowling ball is going to long, or giving you an inconsistent shot when you swing the bowling ball, square up to the lanes a little more with your heavy oil drilled ball. You can always tweak this by, once again, seeing what your bowling ball is telling you.

Until next week, bowl well, make your spares, and check us out for all your holiday needs and tips.

T.J. Yeip is the Manager of GLC Bowling and the Lead Technical Advisor. He is an IBPSIA Advanced Certified Member and former PBA member. You can email your questions to him personally at thomas.yeip@glcbowling.com